Something For the Moment 

• Host your Zoom account through the UUMA:  The UUMA has made a significant investment in our recent upgrade to Zoom One and we hope all existing users will continue to host their accounts through our shared space.  We are excited to say we also have a limited number of added licenses available. If you have not yet renewed, click here.  If you would like to join our Zoom One team with a new account, click here. By joining our Zoom team, you are not only helping your colleagues who need the expanded features, you are also supporting your professional association! We have established a sliding payment scale and have payment plans and scholarships available. Want to learn more? Click here for a quick tour from Janette (using the Zoom One Clip Feature), or sign up to come to our Zoom Learning Session (hosted by our Zoom Success Support Rep) on Friday, February 16.
   
• Mentor Training: Led by Kimberly Quinn Johnson and Larry Peers. Would you like to learn more about mentoring and the mentoring relationship?  This updated and revised mentor training will help you gain clarity and develop practices and tools that will support you in all the ways you mentor colleagues.  This training is limited to UUMA members in Preliminary or Full Fellowship. Registration includes all 5 Thursday sessions: March 7, March 14, May 2, May 9 and May 16, 1-2:30pm ET/ 12-1:30pm CT/ 11am-12:30pm MT/ 10-11:30am PT

Last Minute Links:   Here are two deadlines we want to bring to your attention.  Don’t miss out!

• Saturday, February 10: Deadline to sign up for the UUA E-Mail list 

• Thursday, February 15: 25/50 Honoree Conversation (a second session will be held on Feb 26)

Something for the Journey
Rev. Melissa Carvill Ziemer, Director of Ministries for Collegial Care

How can we grow in wisdom in our roles as clergy? What can help us deepen our understanding of generational worldviews? Where can we turn when we are feeling the loneliness of our vocation? There are many answers to these questions. We could pursue coaching with a goal of deepening our wisdom in one particular area of our ministry. We could sign up to take a class on generational theory. We could go to a chapter gathering to connect with colleagues. Those are all good answers. And here is another one: mentoring. The mentoring relationship can be a place for all of these ways of growing, deepening and connecting plus some. Our mentors can show us the ropes, help us hear ourselves, ask challenging questions and celebrate our successes. In mentoring we need not set an agenda in advance. The heart of mentoring is relational and takes what is for the mentee as a good place to begin. There is room for sharing information when warranted, but more than that, a good mentoring relationship creates space for discernment. The mentor is alternately a colleague, a listener, a guide, a companion, a model, a teacher or a witness as invited by the moment and the mentoring relationship.   

The gifts of mentoring are many, and I hope we can all offer testimony as a result of our experiences of good mentoring in our lives. The possibilities for mentoring are not limited to people early in formation, either. There is room for mentoring across the lifespan of our vocation when we face new roles or challenges, and when we live into new identities or experiences. While we each bring inherent and cultivated gifts when we are invited to mentor, many of us could use some guidance about how we can bring our unique gifts and capacities to the role in support of the flourishing of another. I’m excited to share that Larry Peers and Kimberly Quinn Johnson are working together to revamp and deepen our mentor training experience. We are offering it live this spring on Zoom with support from the UUA and will record the sessions so that prerecorded, on demand mentor training will be available for colleagues who want to learn more about mentoring in the future.  It will be wonderful to have a robust gathering of people for the live training this spring.  If deepening your practice of mentoring calls to you, we would love to have you join us.    

Something Extra

• Ending Well Recording Posted:  If you missed our “Ending Well” Conversation in January, you can click here to watch the recording.  Hosted by our Director of Ministries for Collegial Care, this session included reflections from our UUA Transitions staff as well as from experienced colleagues (settled, contract, interim) with recent experience of working to conclude their parish ministries well. Click here to watch this video.
   
• “Amplifying the Charge” Equips Congregations to Explore Article II Changes through Learning and Worship: Amplifying the Charge is the latest offering from the UUA to help congregations engage with the proposed Article II bylaws revision. It is a four-week, small-group ministry discussion series paired with resources for worship. The materials invite Unitarian Universalists to learn more about our theology, practice, and governance and to engage with our personal experiences of faith, spirit, and humanity. Its creation was led by QuianaDenae Perkins, a third-year seminarian at Starr King School for the Ministry and currently serving as the Learning Resident for the UUA Mid-America Region.

Something for Formation

Ministerial Formation Network Coming Attractions: 

• MFN Formation Conversation: What (Not?) to Wear:  Clergy Garb Edition – Wednesday, February 21, 2024 : 7-8pm ET/6-7pm CT/5-6pm MT/4-5pm PT :  REGISTER NOW

• MFN Mini-Retreat: Theology of Calling – Sunday, March 10, 2024 : 6pm-9pm ET/ 5pm-8pm CT/ 4pm-7pm MT/ 3pm-6pm PT : REGISTER NOW

• Tsubaki Grand Shrine Scholarship: Are you a UU seminarian who is in MFC Candidate Status, does not attend MLTS or SKSM, and has an interest in international and interfaith engagement? You are invited to apply for the UUA’s Tsubaki Grand Shrine Scholarship!